Wild Mass Guessing
by Kireteiru
Summary: Inspired by some of the theories on TvTropes, chapter titles taken from character description tropes there. Early bday present for Gyaku no Sekai! - Who says zanpakutou have to look like swords, anyway? Twoshot.
1. Part 1: Beware the Nice Ones

Title: Wild Mass Guessing – Part 1: Beware the Nice Ones (Killer Rabbit)  
Author: Kireteiru  
Rating: T  
Warnings: language, violence, blood  
Characters: Kenpachi, Yachiru, Ichigo, 11th Division  
Summary: She may look different, but that doesn't mean she _is_. Part one of two.

A/N: Early birthday present for Gyaku no Sekai! Inspired by "Fighting Demons" by Charbonne, "Its Name" by IrkedIndeed, and "Jagged edge" by Tandtroll. /shameless-advertising.

* * *

She knew he'd forgotten her. In a way, it was inevitable. Their district wasn't exactly kind to people; he'd even forgotten his own name!

For decades, he had been the "demon of Zaraki" – and she had been lonely. It was big in his inner world, peaceful, and quiet, many would be surprised to learn – but empty. Oh so empty. She would wander – run through – the forest, toward the sheer rock faces that formed the caldera's rim and the waterfalls that spilled over the edges, but she never reached them. She would dive down to the bottom of the lake at the center of the caldera, trying to find where all of the water was draining away even as it was replenished by the streams and rivers, but she never found it. She would climb the tallest tree she could find, so she could reach the strangely bright night sky overhead and the binary planet and nebulae and galaxies that filled the blackness overhead, but she never reached the top.

When a strong breeze made the tree sway _yet again_, she decided she'd had enough. He was getting into all of these awesome fights _and leaving her out of it_, the prick! Well, if that was the way it was gonna be, she'd just come out and give him an earful.

Only, as strong as he was, he couldn't handle fully externalizing her. He could if she let herself be intangible, a phantom, but she wanted to be solid so she could wail on him for leaving her out. She settled for a condensed form – and found herself getting soaked in blood not her own.

He was there, of course, hacking apart his opponents with That Crazy Grin on his face. She could feel his rushing adrenaline, his rapidly beating heart as if it was her own (which it was, in a way). She watched with eager eyes, delighting in the bloodshed. When the battle was finished, she crawled over to him and touched the crimson coating her Other Self.

It was still warm. She giggled.

He surprised her; he remembered her name. He might not have recognized her for who she was because she wasn't her older self, wasn't wearing the starry kimono that he had first seen her in or had her long, flame like hair. He hadn't realized that it was her name in the first place, but _he remembered her name_.

She decided that maybe she could wait a bit before beating him up for leaving her out of the action.

* * *

His strength was growing. She'd been able to make herself a little bigger, and a little bigger, and a little bigger. He was a captain now, one of the strongest, and he _still_ didn't recognize her.

But no one else realized that she was his sword, either, not even Evil Glasses Bastard, so she supposed that was okay.

She was here and _there_ when he fought Ichi, here and _there _when he fought Bow-Wow and Evil Blind Bastard, Maki-chan, the Bug, the Monkey, the Other Ken-chan and the Other Others, the Wussy Hulk. She watched, and enjoyed the combat right along with him.

One of these days, she'd yell at him and make him let her join.

In the meantime, she watched him hack away at his foes with That Crazy Grin on his face, and licked her lips at the taste of blood on her tongue, rubbed her arms at the phantom feel of blood sliding down her body like thick, sticky, metal-scented rain. She was his Killer Rabbit.

* * *

A/N: For those of you who have never seen _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_, do a Youtube search for Holy Grail Killer Rabbit and watch one of the videos. THIS IS YACHIRU IN DISGUISE, I TELL YOU!


	2. Part 2: Badass and Child Duo

Title: Wild Mass Guessing – Part 2: Badass and Child Duo (Blood Knight)  
Author: Kireteiru  
Rating: T  
Warnings: violence, blood  
Characters: Kenpachi, Yachiru,  
Summary: She didn't need a sword – she needed a protector. So that's what he'd be. Part two of two.

A/N: Early birthday fic for Gyaku no Sekai! Inspired by "There's Something about Zaraki" by drakensis, and vaguely by "The Chosen One" by Kilonji and "Yachiru Knows" by Sarshi. /shameless-advertising.

* * *

[Yachiru!]

The little girl perked up at the sound of the voice, coming from inside her head. Had someone else taken up residence with her? Goodie! She had company! The others were no fun, too focused on making each other not move to pay attention to her.

[Brat! They're gonna make you stop moving too if you don't call me out!]

Call who out? She couldn't make the pictures inside her head come out; how was she supposed to make someone inside her head come out?

[Say my name, brat, or we're both gonna die!]

One of the others had spotted her and was heading in her direction. He had a not nice expression on his face. It made her scared, made her cower back away from the shiny thing he lifted over her head. She was old enough to know that the shiny things made the red come, and when too much red came, people stopped moving.

[Yachiru!]

"Ken-chan!" she screamed, without knowing why.

[Damn well close enough!]

The other was driven to the ground at the sudden pressure that filled the blood-stained clearing, right before his head was chopped off by a furious man clad in black from head to toe. The pink-haired girl was now cradled in the crook of his arm, a far safer place than on the ground about to die. She giggled; his dragonhide jacket felt funny against her skin.

"Hold onta me, Yachiru," he told the girl, shrugging off his jacket to wrap her in it and adjusting his grip on her to make her more secure, "As much as I wanna drag this out, this's gonna havta be quick."

She understood, and grabbed onto his jacket, pulling it tight around her, before she snagged the fabric of his sleeveless black top in her tiny fingers. "Good," he said, "Don't let go." He lifted his own jagged-edged shiny thing, and attacked the others, making her laugh as he made the red come. He grinned, too, as they were soaked in the blood of their foes.

When it was all over, he set her down and adjusted his jacket on her so that she was wearing it properly. Her stomach growled loudly then as he straightened, making him chuckle. "It takes a lot o'energy to manifest a zanpakutou," he said, "Let's find some food." He shifted her so that she was clinging to his back, her tiny feet braced on his leather belt. "My name is Zaraki Kenpachi," he told her, "but I s'pose 'Ken-chan' will do fer now."

* * *

He took surprisingly good care of her. She was too young to understand, too tiny to need a sword, too weak to hold her own in a fight, so he fought in her place. He fought to keep her safe, ate food to lessen his burden on her reiryoku, and slept to give her a break from keeping him fully active, even though his didn't need the rest. He bought a wakizashi that was just her size and began teaching her how to fight with it, so that one day she would be able to defend herself, without his help. He did right by her, and was determined to keep doing so.

When he heard about Shinigami and the Seireitei, he knew that she would be safe there. The only real problem they had was getting there; his sense of direction was just as bad as her own. When they finally _did_ get there, he asked her what her favorite number between one and thirteen. "Eleven!" she chirped, and that was that.

The captain was embarrassingly easy to kill; the fight ended in one hit. It wasn't his fault that they just assumed he was a separate being from Yachiru; he just told them to believe whatever the hell they liked, figuring out rather fast that their swords weren't like him. Besides, it's not like he actually _was_ a sword in the first place; he was a zanpakutou, yeah, but that was where the similarities ended. Who said that soul cutters had to look like swords anyway?

She would never be able to wield him the way other Shinigami wielded their zanpakutou because he wasn't like theirs. She would have to become strong enough to take down opponents with an asauchi or – God forbid – kidou. Until she learned to do either of those things, or found a way to change him into a legit sword, he would be her protector, her Blood Knight.


End file.
